Unfrozen Water Content in Representative Bentonites of Different Origin Subjected to Cyclic Freezing and Thawing

The unfrozen water content in frozen soils strongly influences heat and mass transport processes. Despite massive research work, the actual implications of the freeze–thaw process on unfrozen water still remain unknown. The main objective of this study was to examine the hypothetical effect of a number of previous freeze–thaw cycles on the unfrozen water content during the current cycle. Several bentonites (Stx‐1b from Wyoming, SWy‐2 from Texas, as well as Ca, Na, and K forms of bentonite from Chmielnik) with different water contents were subjected to repeated freezing to −90°C and thawing at 20°C in a differential scanning calorimeter (DSC). The total number of cycles was five. The unfrozen water contents were determined on warming during each cycle by the use of the stochastic deconvolution of the DSC signal. According to the ANOVA results, the freeze–thaw effect on the unfrozen water content w u in the bentonites was not statistically significant. A clear pattern of alterations of w u with the number of consecutive cycles could be distinguished, however, depending on the major exchangeable cation. The kind of exchangeable cation played a predominant role in the temperature dependence of the unfrozen water content. The specific surface area strongly affected the unfrozen water content at lower temperatures, i.e., at −5°C and below. Closer to 0?°C, the effect of the specific surface became absolutely insignificant, and the clay fraction content determined by the laser diffraction method proved to be the soil property best correlating with the unfrozen water content at −1°C.